Ethics and Liberal Illumination
Someone once argued that in a way, literacy acts like a sort of incurable virus; you contract it and then you're stuck with it forever, never being able to return to your previous state. Despite the negative implications the virus comparison elicits, it's true in a way. I am literate, but I can never go back to seeing letters as inscrutable lines and symbols. That way of looking at writing is irretrievably lost to me. Now, I am glad I can read, of course, but the ethical implications are interesting here, because altering someone permanently without hi/r informed consent is always ethically murky.
But how could my consent have been informed? Even if I had not been a child, the only way I could have been informed of what I was missing and what I would lose would be to actually teach me to read. One simply cannot be informed without having received information. So, basically, what we have here is one group of people (usually adults) deciding what's best for another group of people (usually children). Is this ethically sound? Well, I personally think it is. Literacy gives society enormous potential, and gives an individual enormous power over hi/r own life. I would hope, if I were to teach someone to read, that s/he would benefit from it and appreciate it, but I can't be totally sure s/he would. What if s/he were upset at what I had taken from h/ir? What if s/he would have been happier the way s/he was?
Similarly, is it okay to illuminate liberal concepts to people?
To better understand this quandary, think of it this way: Doctors know that giving a patient a diagnosis can cause stress, and that stress can negatively impact health. Does this mean that a doctor is harming hi/r patients by telling them the truth of their condition? Few would argue that keeping the truth from a patient is beneficial, yet being given a poor prognosis can easily cause suffering, sometimes well in excess of that which is currently being caused by the very disease in question. So the question is: would the patient rather be harmed by a disease s/he never knew s/he had, or is the chance for treatment worth the harm the knowledge causes? The physician is in a unique situation; s/he must make this decision for the patient, and, importantly, without the patient's consent.
There is an arrogance at work in this argument in that it assumes I am correct in my leftist assertions that internal distortions of a person's perception of reality (eg, delusion, denial, psychological numbing, ignorance) are ultimately responsible for all of the major social problems with which our society struggles (eg, meat-eating, religion, heteronormativity, violence and intolerance). But this assumption, whether we realise it or not, is at the heart of the liberal philosophy; it's what distinguishes our viewpoints from the conservative, but that's another essay for another day.
In short, misunderstanding causes suffering. People don't know or understand the impact their behaviour has, or the problems their ignorance causes. But just as with literacy, they cannot give their full informed consent to being presented with this knowledge.
Now, one could easily make a case for teaching literacy, saying how very unlikely it is that any suffering will come of the newly-acquired knowledge. But the same cannot be said of liberalism. There is no doubt: when I open someone's eyes to a liberal concept, there is every possibility it will cause them suffering. It's a nasty little cocktail of alienation, frustration, rage and despair, and it's familiar on some scale to every person who has ever worked for a progressive cause**.
Take, for example, the issue of the use of the word "gay" in the negative sense. This is undoubtedly a harmful behaviour, and yet otherwise well-meaning people will use it; I myself used it as a teenager. Once I understood the pain this caused others, I stopped. But this understanding had other, more far-reaching effects on my behaviour and my worldview. It began to alienate me when I would hear others, often people I loved, use it incorrectly; I began to feel the weight of the responsibility to curb this behaviour in others. Then it frustrated me, because I kept hearing the same arguments for it over and over-- how hard is it to just respect people's feelings? And sometimes I despaired, because no matter how much I fought against it, it seemed there was always someone else lined up to say it.
That's just a small issue, but we can see how it works. Espousing broader issues like civil rights and entire schools of thought like third-wave feminism, of course, can alienate us on a fundamental and sometimes irrecoverable way from close friends and family, even lovers, and our support networks suffer. My third-wave feminism, for example, has affected me much as literacy has, by changing my perception permanently. I can no longer be contented with the explanation that, say, parents who deny the same freedoms to teenage daughters as they would grant their sons simply love their daughters more. Instead of feeling secure in that happy illusion, I am forced to confront the unpleasant notion that parents would inflict harmful bigotry and sexism on their own children.
And it is an unpleasant truth, ultimately, that we must face as liberals: that the world is full of racism and sexism and heterocentrism and violence, and it need not be so. Having your eyes opened to that can be jarring, for certain, and living with the knowledge can be positively agonizing at times.
The same way my mind involuntarily reads lines on a printed page as words, as having meaning, I see basic components of life in a broader, more meaningful context. I use the bus system in my city, for example, not only because it gets me to the store, but because public transportation reduces the social problems of racism and isolation inherent to urban sprawl, and reduces the need for dependence on fossil fuels. When I see a house in the suburbs, it does not bring to mind romantic visions of family and childhood, but rather conjures up anger toward white flight and heteronormativity. A barbecue does not inspire me to socialize, but fills me with fear and disgust at the casual slaughter and consumption of animal flesh. My liberalism interferes with my participating in social functions such as weddings, funerals and religious ceremonies, considered obligatory by my culture.
We're often asked why we cannot simply "relax" and allow *ist behaviour to occur around us, but the truth is, it isn't that simple. Let me ask a question: If someone tells a racist joke, should you laugh? There is no way non-polarized way out of this social situation. On one hand, laughing at the joke validates and perpetuates racist behaviour. On the other hand, not laughing at the joke (even without condemning the speaker), is considered a social offense. Most consider the former to be the proper social response, because it doesn't immediately offend those present, and thus is considered harmless by most. A leftist knows better. Given the options of either A) perpetuating racism or B) offending a person displaying racist behaviour, the choice is obvious. But it's not pleasant.
But that's not my fault. It's the fault of the teller of the joke, first of all, and second, it seems a little creepy to me that the only socially acceptable response is a positive one. By all rights, I should have three options:
A) Respond positively,
B) Respond negatively, or
C) Do not respond at all.
But, as I've mentioned above, options B and C are both considered unacceptable. So the only way in which I can avoid offending the speaker is to give them a positive response to their racism. This is, therefore, considered the polite, and therefore default, response. But how is it different from how a self-proclaimed racist would respond? Surely someone who is opposed to racism would want to respond to a racist joke in a way that differentiated hi/r from a racist, and yet so many people, while claiming to oppose racism, give positive reinforcement to it on a daily basis.
I've decided I'm not going to do that anymore.
It really should have been so simple. But by default, our culture engages in *ist behaviour, so soon after I became a third-wave feminist, I found myself in more and more of these situations with friends and family, where I had to choose between offending the person present or allow *ism. Because of this, I inadvertently introduced a friend of mine to the theories of third-wave feminism. I did not do this with premeditation; it merely happened because he listened when I spoke up against some of the behaviour he demonstrated. Before any of us knew it, his worldview had also changed. I watched him as he began to feel that alienation and frustration I had struggled with for so long.
He came to us one day; he'd had a bad day, been misunderstood over and over and had so many frustrating encounters. He looked miserable and lonely. "How do you stand it?" he asked, "What do you do about this?" And I wanted to give him an answer for it; I suddenly felt irresponsible for not having a universal liberal cure-all*** to help ease this distress, after all, I had inflicted this on him. I could only think of one answer to how we deal with the hardships of being a feminist. "We make more," I said, almost as an apology. It was, in truth, why I had made him feminist, and it suddenly felt selfish.
But ultimately, it doesn't matter.
My motivation for showing someone the truth doesn't make it any less important for them to know. Like a parent teaching hi/r child to read, I have to believe that I'm doing is for the best. We've reasoned the best we can, and we have two choices: either educate people or don't. I won't accept that latter option, and as an intellectual, I shouldn't.
Our discomfort with being leftist in an unfair world is nothing compared to the suffering caused by the problems we're trying to solve. The amount of discomfort I cause myself or the speaker by asking someone not to use the word "gay" improperly is completely worth the stride it makes toward highlighting and eradicating homophobia. The alienation I feel when someone tells a racist joke is dwarfed by the alienation caused by racism itself. And yes, it takes a lot of effort to simply to withhold one's support from conservative causes, and in many ways this can actually wear on us more than taking an active stance against them. But as liberals, we should know how important it is to persevere; awareness of such things is one of our defining characteristics.
See, we already suffer when we live in a world where *ism is so prevalent as to be the norm, regardless of whether we're aware of it. We're all affected by ghettos and hate crimes and prejudice and violence whether they're a direct part of our lives or not. (And really, even if that weren't the case, how could we continue feeling like our security were worth protecting at the cost of denying it to others?) Referring back to the medical metaphor, we recognise that the disease would harm the patient anyway, and only by knowing hi/r diagnosis can the patient be expected to seek treatment.
So ultimately, life is full of ethical grey areas, and because of our awareness, we on the left are the best the human race has to offer in terms of morality. We simply have to work in the best way we can, making the most informed decisions we can, unless someone can come up with a better idea. Yes, we are altering people, and permanently, but we didn't create the problems that cause them to need to be altered. We're simply seeing a problem, and trying to fix it as best we can. And yes, it's true there are plenty of ways in which this could be construed to be selfish, but in my opinion, it would be much more selfish to sit idly by.
**Some art I'd like to recommend that deals with this topic of the suffering caused by having one's metaphorical eyes opened:
a) Television: Doctor Who 2005 (NewWho), Season 1, Episode 2 "The End Of The World" (I don't want to give any spoilers, but pay particular attention about five minutes before the end, right after they get out of the TARDIS).
b) Writing: Plato's Allegory Of The Cave.
c) Music: Jackson Browne's "Doctor My Eyes" (seen here incorporated into a Doctor Who AMV. The video is mostly irrelevant, but it will give you access to the song for academic purposes if you don't own it).
***Well, there is actually a universal liberal cure-all, and it grows naturally out of the ground all over the place (well, here in Kentucky, anyway), and it can tone down anxiety and depression, as well as making you feel creative, open, and closer to your friends. But by an amazing coincidence, it's illegal. Wonder why that would be?
But how could my consent have been informed? Even if I had not been a child, the only way I could have been informed of what I was missing and what I would lose would be to actually teach me to read. One simply cannot be informed without having received information. So, basically, what we have here is one group of people (usually adults) deciding what's best for another group of people (usually children). Is this ethically sound? Well, I personally think it is. Literacy gives society enormous potential, and gives an individual enormous power over hi/r own life. I would hope, if I were to teach someone to read, that s/he would benefit from it and appreciate it, but I can't be totally sure s/he would. What if s/he were upset at what I had taken from h/ir? What if s/he would have been happier the way s/he was?
Similarly, is it okay to illuminate liberal concepts to people?
To better understand this quandary, think of it this way: Doctors know that giving a patient a diagnosis can cause stress, and that stress can negatively impact health. Does this mean that a doctor is harming hi/r patients by telling them the truth of their condition? Few would argue that keeping the truth from a patient is beneficial, yet being given a poor prognosis can easily cause suffering, sometimes well in excess of that which is currently being caused by the very disease in question. So the question is: would the patient rather be harmed by a disease s/he never knew s/he had, or is the chance for treatment worth the harm the knowledge causes? The physician is in a unique situation; s/he must make this decision for the patient, and, importantly, without the patient's consent.
There is an arrogance at work in this argument in that it assumes I am correct in my leftist assertions that internal distortions of a person's perception of reality (eg, delusion, denial, psychological numbing, ignorance) are ultimately responsible for all of the major social problems with which our society struggles (eg, meat-eating, religion, heteronormativity, violence and intolerance). But this assumption, whether we realise it or not, is at the heart of the liberal philosophy; it's what distinguishes our viewpoints from the conservative, but that's another essay for another day.
In short, misunderstanding causes suffering. People don't know or understand the impact their behaviour has, or the problems their ignorance causes. But just as with literacy, they cannot give their full informed consent to being presented with this knowledge.
Now, one could easily make a case for teaching literacy, saying how very unlikely it is that any suffering will come of the newly-acquired knowledge. But the same cannot be said of liberalism. There is no doubt: when I open someone's eyes to a liberal concept, there is every possibility it will cause them suffering. It's a nasty little cocktail of alienation, frustration, rage and despair, and it's familiar on some scale to every person who has ever worked for a progressive cause**.
Take, for example, the issue of the use of the word "gay" in the negative sense. This is undoubtedly a harmful behaviour, and yet otherwise well-meaning people will use it; I myself used it as a teenager. Once I understood the pain this caused others, I stopped. But this understanding had other, more far-reaching effects on my behaviour and my worldview. It began to alienate me when I would hear others, often people I loved, use it incorrectly; I began to feel the weight of the responsibility to curb this behaviour in others. Then it frustrated me, because I kept hearing the same arguments for it over and over-- how hard is it to just respect people's feelings? And sometimes I despaired, because no matter how much I fought against it, it seemed there was always someone else lined up to say it.
That's just a small issue, but we can see how it works. Espousing broader issues like civil rights and entire schools of thought like third-wave feminism, of course, can alienate us on a fundamental and sometimes irrecoverable way from close friends and family, even lovers, and our support networks suffer. My third-wave feminism, for example, has affected me much as literacy has, by changing my perception permanently. I can no longer be contented with the explanation that, say, parents who deny the same freedoms to teenage daughters as they would grant their sons simply love their daughters more. Instead of feeling secure in that happy illusion, I am forced to confront the unpleasant notion that parents would inflict harmful bigotry and sexism on their own children.
And it is an unpleasant truth, ultimately, that we must face as liberals: that the world is full of racism and sexism and heterocentrism and violence, and it need not be so. Having your eyes opened to that can be jarring, for certain, and living with the knowledge can be positively agonizing at times.
The same way my mind involuntarily reads lines on a printed page as words, as having meaning, I see basic components of life in a broader, more meaningful context. I use the bus system in my city, for example, not only because it gets me to the store, but because public transportation reduces the social problems of racism and isolation inherent to urban sprawl, and reduces the need for dependence on fossil fuels. When I see a house in the suburbs, it does not bring to mind romantic visions of family and childhood, but rather conjures up anger toward white flight and heteronormativity. A barbecue does not inspire me to socialize, but fills me with fear and disgust at the casual slaughter and consumption of animal flesh. My liberalism interferes with my participating in social functions such as weddings, funerals and religious ceremonies, considered obligatory by my culture.
We're often asked why we cannot simply "relax" and allow *ist behaviour to occur around us, but the truth is, it isn't that simple. Let me ask a question: If someone tells a racist joke, should you laugh? There is no way non-polarized way out of this social situation. On one hand, laughing at the joke validates and perpetuates racist behaviour. On the other hand, not laughing at the joke (even without condemning the speaker), is considered a social offense. Most consider the former to be the proper social response, because it doesn't immediately offend those present, and thus is considered harmless by most. A leftist knows better. Given the options of either A) perpetuating racism or B) offending a person displaying racist behaviour, the choice is obvious. But it's not pleasant.
But that's not my fault. It's the fault of the teller of the joke, first of all, and second, it seems a little creepy to me that the only socially acceptable response is a positive one. By all rights, I should have three options:
A) Respond positively,
B) Respond negatively, or
C) Do not respond at all.
But, as I've mentioned above, options B and C are both considered unacceptable. So the only way in which I can avoid offending the speaker is to give them a positive response to their racism. This is, therefore, considered the polite, and therefore default, response. But how is it different from how a self-proclaimed racist would respond? Surely someone who is opposed to racism would want to respond to a racist joke in a way that differentiated hi/r from a racist, and yet so many people, while claiming to oppose racism, give positive reinforcement to it on a daily basis.
I've decided I'm not going to do that anymore.
It really should have been so simple. But by default, our culture engages in *ist behaviour, so soon after I became a third-wave feminist, I found myself in more and more of these situations with friends and family, where I had to choose between offending the person present or allow *ism. Because of this, I inadvertently introduced a friend of mine to the theories of third-wave feminism. I did not do this with premeditation; it merely happened because he listened when I spoke up against some of the behaviour he demonstrated. Before any of us knew it, his worldview had also changed. I watched him as he began to feel that alienation and frustration I had struggled with for so long.
He came to us one day; he'd had a bad day, been misunderstood over and over and had so many frustrating encounters. He looked miserable and lonely. "How do you stand it?" he asked, "What do you do about this?" And I wanted to give him an answer for it; I suddenly felt irresponsible for not having a universal liberal cure-all*** to help ease this distress, after all, I had inflicted this on him. I could only think of one answer to how we deal with the hardships of being a feminist. "We make more," I said, almost as an apology. It was, in truth, why I had made him feminist, and it suddenly felt selfish.
But ultimately, it doesn't matter.
My motivation for showing someone the truth doesn't make it any less important for them to know. Like a parent teaching hi/r child to read, I have to believe that I'm doing is for the best. We've reasoned the best we can, and we have two choices: either educate people or don't. I won't accept that latter option, and as an intellectual, I shouldn't.
Our discomfort with being leftist in an unfair world is nothing compared to the suffering caused by the problems we're trying to solve. The amount of discomfort I cause myself or the speaker by asking someone not to use the word "gay" improperly is completely worth the stride it makes toward highlighting and eradicating homophobia. The alienation I feel when someone tells a racist joke is dwarfed by the alienation caused by racism itself. And yes, it takes a lot of effort to simply to withhold one's support from conservative causes, and in many ways this can actually wear on us more than taking an active stance against them. But as liberals, we should know how important it is to persevere; awareness of such things is one of our defining characteristics.
See, we already suffer when we live in a world where *ism is so prevalent as to be the norm, regardless of whether we're aware of it. We're all affected by ghettos and hate crimes and prejudice and violence whether they're a direct part of our lives or not. (And really, even if that weren't the case, how could we continue feeling like our security were worth protecting at the cost of denying it to others?) Referring back to the medical metaphor, we recognise that the disease would harm the patient anyway, and only by knowing hi/r diagnosis can the patient be expected to seek treatment.
So ultimately, life is full of ethical grey areas, and because of our awareness, we on the left are the best the human race has to offer in terms of morality. We simply have to work in the best way we can, making the most informed decisions we can, unless someone can come up with a better idea. Yes, we are altering people, and permanently, but we didn't create the problems that cause them to need to be altered. We're simply seeing a problem, and trying to fix it as best we can. And yes, it's true there are plenty of ways in which this could be construed to be selfish, but in my opinion, it would be much more selfish to sit idly by.
**Some art I'd like to recommend that deals with this topic of the suffering caused by having one's metaphorical eyes opened:
a) Television: Doctor Who 2005 (NewWho), Season 1, Episode 2 "The End Of The World" (I don't want to give any spoilers, but pay particular attention about five minutes before the end, right after they get out of the TARDIS).
b) Writing: Plato's Allegory Of The Cave.
c) Music: Jackson Browne's "Doctor My Eyes" (seen here incorporated into a Doctor Who AMV. The video is mostly irrelevant, but it will give you access to the song for academic purposes if you don't own it).
***Well, there is actually a universal liberal cure-all, and it grows naturally out of the ground all over the place (well, here in Kentucky, anyway), and it can tone down anxiety and depression, as well as making you feel creative, open, and closer to your friends. But by an amazing coincidence, it's illegal. Wonder why that would be?